Ram 3200 or 3600 and question on O/S installation

[DarTon]

Hi,

In terms of RAM, the PCS configurator doesn't seem to say exactly what I'll be getting. Am I right in assuming the 3200 is CL16 and the 3600 is CL18? The difference in price is marginal (say £38 for 32gb) but on the internet there is some difference of opinion whether it really matters. Some argue AMD likes the 3600 more, others argue 3600/18=3600/16=200 so it's marginal etc. Do those who buy 3600 ram, overclock it to say CL16 or 15 to gain genuine benefit?

Also is there any point in buying more than 16gb from PCS? The cost of moving from 16gb to 32gb seems to be over £100 but I can buy 2x8gb of 3600 Vengence for £80 and fit it myself. I don't really ever see any likelihood I'd want 64gb in the next 5 years. Even 32gb is fairly marginal and only comes into play when I have VMs open.

Also, with regard to the O/S, I've got 5 PCs in the house all with licences for either Win 10 Home or Pro. Ideally I'd just like to transfer the retail Win10 Pro licence from the oldest machine. Will PCS install an unlicensed copy of say Win 10 Home which I can then upgrade and activate or will I have to install Win 10, all drivers etc, myself via a USB if I select the "No OS" option?

Thanks in advance

 

[ubuysa]

Hi,

In terms of RAM, the PCS configurator doesn't seem to say exactly what I'll be getting. Am I right in assuming the 3200 is CL16 and the 3600 is CL18? The difference in price is marginal (say £38 for 32gb) but on the internet there is some difference of opinion whether it really matters. Some argue AMD likes the 3600 more, others argue 3600/18=3600/16=200 so it's marginal etc. Do those who buy 3600 ram, overclock it to say CL16 or 15 to gain genuine benefit?

I'll let others more knowledgeable in this area that I to answer this for you.

Also is there any point in buying more than 16gb from PCS? The cost of moving from 16gb to 32gb seems to be over £100 but I can buy 2x8gb of 3600 Vengence for £80 and fit it myself. I don't really ever see any likelihood I'd want 64gb in the next 5 years. Even 32gb is fairly marginal and only comes into play when I have VMs open.

Looking at that last sentence I'd go for 32GB now if you can afford it. IMO you should always buy as much RAM as you think you'll need - there is no substitute for RAM and running out is painful.

Also, with regard to the O/S, I've got 5 PCs in the house all with licences for either Win 10 Home or Pro. Ideally I'd just like to transfer the retail Win10 Pro licence from the oldest machine. Will PCS install an unlicensed copy of say Win 10 Home which I can then upgrade and activate or will I have to install Win 10, all drivers etc, myself via a USB if I select the "No OS" option?

Thanks in advance

If you buy with no-OS the PC will come with a copy of Windows installed that PCS used for testing purposes. Based on long experience we always advise people not to simply activate this system but to install a fresh copy yourself (from USB). PCS will provide a drivers DVD and there is a downloads section in your main PCS account with drivers and control software etc. However, this is not updated as drivers mature and we always recommend allowing Windows Update to install all the drivers it can (which is most of them) and only use the PCS drivers for ones it can't find and which you can't find elsewhere. We do recommend installing the latest Nvidia graphics driver direct from their website - these change so often that the Windows libraries don't always have the latest version.

Oh, and welcome to the forums!

 

[MrWilson]

You are correct in saying that PCS uses 3200 CL16 and 3600 CL18, and that due to the differing CAS latencies there isn’t much performance difference in certain tasks, such as gaming. Some productivity tasks do benefit from faster RAM though, in particular audio production.
If you want to self source your own RAM you can just buy a 4GB 2400mhz stick through the configurator; PCS sell complete systems so there is no option to select no RAM at all. You might find a cheaper RAM deal elsewhere, but be aware that the RAM will not be covered by PCS warranty. Some users have had success overclocking their 3600mhz RAM down to CL16, but that is also down to the silicon lottery and some RAM sticks may be able to be overclocked better than others.

 

[MrWilson]

This is a nice foray into the world of RAM OC from some of our forum users.

Ram OC

Not sure if you can OC ram whilst under pcs warranty but... it’s literally free performance, especially at 1080p. I’ve never OC’d ram before, but i just got some new ram and the box states ‘designed for extreme overclocking’. It’s already solid @ 3600mhz cl16 (16-19-19-36). Anyone else dabbled...

www.pcspecialist.co.uk

 

[DarTon]

Thanks for the replies.

I'm not sure I really want to get into the weeds by OC RAM (despite it seemingly being much easier these days). So, you are telling me that 3200 CL16 and 3600 CL18 are very similar. So I might aswell save some money and go for 3200 CL16. Or If I want 3600 CL16, then I set the configurator for 1x4gb 2400MHz and buy the real stuff from Scan/Box for a bit less than than PCS want me to pay for 3600 CL18. In fact, if I buy 2xgb 2400Mhz, I could use those in old i7-6700 that my kids use for school to take it to 16gb. Two birds, one stone.

I think I might just go for the no O/S option. I've upgraded a few of the machines in the house over the last few years by adding new SDDs and installing a fresh Windows and it was remarkably easy (or perhaps my expectations were very pessimistic). If nothing else it means zero bloatware which I much prefer.

One last question on PSUs. I was looking at some recommended builds on the Check this spec! sub-forum and the recommendation for the sort of spec I'm looking at (Ryzen 5900X, 3070, 32gb, 2x NVMe SDD, H115i) was the RMx850. I've only specced the RMx750 just based on the Outervision PSU tool calculating my load at 448W. I thought that a 60% ratio was pretty reasonable. Am I underestimating the possible max loads with these newer CPUs/GPUs? My last two builds both used 750W PSUs without an issue so I just went with that.

 

[MrWilson]

It’s your call with the RAM, sounds like you’ve got a good plan there, just bear in mind what I’ve posted above RE:Warranty.

Generally we spec 850W to allow room for upgrading; this is especially pertinent with gaming PC builds. While you’re happy with your 3070 at the moment your needs might change a few years down the line and you might need a more powerful GPU, the 850W gives you a little more headroom there. There also used to be very little difference in price between the 750 and 850W models (used to be £3) so it was a no brainer to opt for the beefier PSU. Now that there’s a wider gap (around £20) the 750W RMx has a definite niche.
If you wanted to post your spec we can have a look at it and see if we can optimise it a little, but with the parts you’ve listed you seem to be going in the